>> this is al jazeera america, i'm tony harris live in new york city. tha student in arapaho high school came with a rifle asking for a particular teacher. a man working for the c.i.a. robert levinson was not an u.s. government employee when he vanished but the administration would not comment on whether he had ties to the c.i.a. an advisory panel set up to

national security agency submitted it's report two days early. it has recommended dozens of changes. at the same time the white house said it will kee. terry loewen planned to drive a bomb-laden van into to an airport and blow it up. those are your headline stories. "real money with ali velshi" is next. >> the truth about taxes in america, sure, the rich get hit hard but the middle class shoulders its chair, too. i'll break it down for you. also the boss is watching you, american workers under surveillance on the job like never before.

what you don't know about cracking technology, bus i go one-on-one with former president jimmy cart for set the record straight for america on apartheid and nelson mandela. i'm ali velshi, and this is "real money." >> this is "real money." you are the most important part of the show. so join our live conversation for the next half hour on twitter, @aj real money and @ali velshi. your comments are really important to me. whether you like or not chances are that you're being watched when you're at work. bosses have always found ways to keep tabs on their workers, but now technology allows for a level of surveillance never before seen. some of you can see where they're tracking you. other tracking tools are so

secretive they can't be seen at all. workers cry big brother but companies say they need to protect their company. now it goes beyond the office walls. at first glance the small boston office looks like any other start up. but thanks to these unassuming white badges every movement and conversation of these start up employees even their stress levels is being tracked. >> if daniel and i are interacting right now there are a few things happening. we're talking. looking at my tone of voice, my volume. they can figure out right now that daniel and i are facing each other, using the receiver, that's the little window right there. >> ben is president and co-founder of sociometric solutions and also a test subject for its own technology. >> we have a motion sensor and a bluetooth radio.

>> sensors in the badge record how often workers get up from their desk to their conservati conservationnal patterns and allows employees to collect hard data on the soft science of behavior. call center workers showed that they completed calls faster just by taking lunch and coffee breaks at the same time. >> at minimum saving the company $15 million a year. >> reporter: it may seem novel, but this increasingly effort. >> workers spend 2.5 hours a day for personal use while at work. >> reporter: selling monitoring software used by businesses and u.s. government agencies. >> we can see if alert words are showing up more than others.

>> reporter: it allows managers to set up alerts when workers use the word sexy or visit certain website. anything from online gambling to facebook. they can receive notification each time their name comes up in an employee e-mail, and watch the recording of a workers computer scene. the demand for the software has exploded over the last tee years aover the last threeyears as cor employees to work from home. >> an employer can protect its interests without this kind of wide invasive spying program. >> lou president of the national institute said indiscriminate monitoring hurts productivity. >> it slows things down. >> but miller counters that most workers today accept workplace monitoring as part of the job,

and socio metric solutions gives badge data without employee names attached. now it's spreading targeting the estimated 60 million people who work outside the office in industries like trucking, oil and gas even construction. >> it's a blind spot for the business. but what we do is akin to turning on the light. >> reporter: a black box hardwired into the vehicle feeds data back to company offices giving supervisors realtime information on whether a drive is braking too hard, using fuel efficiently or making deliveries on time. >> it's not really about watching the employee, it's really about how can we give them the tools that they need in the field to do a better job. >> reporter: major partnerships with ford and volvo, it won't be long before smart tracking systems become the norm no

matter the try. >> it's not just truck companies or truck drivers, pretty much every vertical industry in any size company needs this kind of technology. >> reporter: david schuster, al jazeera. >> now even the most strident advocatescies admitted the need to watching employees, protecting intellectual property, theft, and it can be an effective deterrent to those things. a recent academic study of restaurant using theft monito monitoring software reduced in 22% reduction in serve theft and the staff worked harder and drink sales were up by 10%. i've been asking you what kind of restrictions should be placed on workplace monitoring. murray said i think most tracks

has no part in your life. tell me what you think by tweeting me @aj real money or @ali velshi or on our facebook. "naked employee" best book name ever. fred, good to see you. let's draw a distinction. i don't see any problem with them tracking trucks and trucks drivers, fuel, and efficiency things all around. i might evening interested in tracking social media because you have choices what you do there. but voyeurism, they can see your screen, they can track your behavior habits. >> absolutely. >> that's different. there is a level of transparency missing. >> that is exactly the word that you want to focus on, transparency.

because you can talk about the productivity studies, but they work best when the employees know what is going on. that's not true when you've got hidden surveillance because it effects employee morale. one of the studies i came across when i did the naked employee, we're start to go track bathroom habits of their employs. >> ostensibly they wanted to do that to see if people were washing their hands. >> which is a legitimate purpose. there is no question. you want clean servers. but you start to get into this worry that people are start to go really draw conclusions about people's lives based on these kinds of things. social media makes it worse. you can go into social media to see whether or not your brand is being trashed. but if you're trying to find out how your employees live their lives, their private lives, that's a boundary they shouldn't cross. >> is this going all in one direction or will this pendulum swing back in at some point. i get companies are doing this because they can in many cases.

if i can monitor every time one of my employees uses my name in an e-mail, i probably would. >> and you probably should. as we look at the world around us which want to know about bomb threats. there is workplace violence. but the question is whether or not companies are adhering to best practices. because there are ethical issues involved here. and people should not feel like the moment they walk into a workplace al jazeera, apple, you name it, that they give up every aspect of their privacy. >> part of it is that in the old days before social media and e-mail you knew your employees was trash talking you as a boss. now you're finding out that they're doing it over e-mail. is that wrong? >> well, the problem with technology is that it goes into place and goes much farther and much faster than ever before. previously the boss had to be at the next booth at the bar to hear that they're being trash talked. now it's being done automatically. and in the bathroom example

technology is going into places where people should not be spied on. >> the tracking interbehavior, internet shopping, that's fair. i don't want you shopping on my time. some of it is gamble, some of it is porn. >> at what point should be ge getting in trouble with your company. >> you had have to be off the wall advocate to say that people should do private stuff when they are getting paid for work. the question is where is the impact on employee morale. if they're trying to record internet behavior or publicized behaviors of public activities at home that have no impact on work, that is a bridge too far. >> great conversation, great book. fred lane the author of "naked employee." thank you very much. >> thank you. >> the multi headed animal that

roams america's states counties and cities and takes money out of your pocket whether you're rich, or poor to pay for cops and mosquito abatement. talking about taxes. and surprisingly jimmy carter's interview with me. >> i had many talks with nelson mandela. i never heard him say that he was grateful to the united states. >> that story and more as "real money" continues. keep it right here. conservative objections are getting some traction, but the betting is now this evening that this is going to pass the house of representatives on thursday and go to the senate the next

week and end up on the president's desk, joie. >> mike, thanks for being with us. we'll follow up. ahead. the international space station marks 15 years. are we getting enough bang for our buck, or is it just taking up space? get it? >> this week's budget deal in washington buyings america time to grapple with difficult subjects like tax reform. that's great and i'm going to discuss reform with an expert in a moment, but first i want you to understand why it's dangerous to under estimate the complexity

of taxes in the united states. it's something that politicians do all the time. think of this as a multi headed animal that lives in every state, county and town in the country, and this animal's appetite effects everyone from the rich to the poor. aside from federal income tax there are payroll taxes, state taxes, loads more taxes as this chart created by business insiders josh barro shows when you aid all these taxes together the americans who earn the least shell out 13% compared to the 25% by the middle income group and the rich pay 43%. that's a different discussion whether that's fair or not, but we all share the tax burden. some say only the rich pay tax, but no, everyone pays tax. changing the federal tax code is only one part of the challenge. the enormity of the catc tax isn

america has grown over time. here is one reason, the so-called governmental you wants that can tax you has ballooned. from 81,780 in 1982 to 90 90,05. here are the states with the most tax units. all of these states have the highest tax burden in the country except texas which has no state income tax. as we talk about how to make this more fair and rationale let's not lose sight of the big picture. it's far more than just the federal income tax.

and your view of the tax picture has a lot to do with the state, city and county that you call home. let's dive into what steps should be taken by congress and local authorities to make the tax situation in america simpler and more fair no matter what you earn or where you live. david kay johnson is a columnist for al jazeera america. he's a pulitzer prize winner reporter, and recent book "fine prin print:how big compans use fine print to rob you blind." i may be overstating the tax that we may go somewhere with tax reform, but people hold up these dumb ideas that we should have a flat tax and the poor don't pay tax and the rich pay all the tax. it is a fact that the rich pay most of the income tax in this country. >> that's correct, but many of the rich pay little or no tax.

if you're very wealthy, if you're bill gates or billionaire you can borrow against your assets and interest rate is 2%. so why would you pay 15% tax. warren buffet a few years ago revealed that his tax rate was within what i guess what it was. he had a company that was sold and cashed out, he had no choice but to take the money. wealthy people can live free of the income tax and many do. >> people at the lower part of the income scale pay a bunch of taxes. >> especially state taxes. >> when you earn that little money, you need more of it. >> that's the fundamental concept that the

>> joining me now is lisa fletcher from the stream. you're going hyper local for this show. >> we're looking at rural alaska and look at school closings there, but it's a broader implication for america. >> what do alaskan kids do when their schools close. >> it's not a good situation but

they're trying to get creative. they're trying to hold on to the textural fabric of our country that many feel is slipping away. >> that's "the stream" tonight.